Tax season always raises the question: Where do our tax dollars go? The Big Picture points out a tool for calculating, based on your salary and filing status, what your tax dollars support.

Here's the sample provided by Big Picture, based on a $100,000 salary:

Give the calculator a try for yourself, at this link.

The two Specialty Surgical Center facilities have been paying the same, relatively lower business tax rate as doctors, lawyers and other professional companies. The tax is a flat fee of about $1,300 for the first 2,080 hours of billable hours and 62 cents for each additional billable hour. But City Hall contends that because the surgery center owners lease out their space to other surgeons, a portion of their revenues should be taxed at the rate that real estate leasing companies pay, which is about $23 for every $1,000 of gross receipts. As a result, the city figures the owners of these two surgery centers should be paying about $150,000 a year in business taxes, about four times what they currently pay. The centers are both jointly owned by a group of physicians and Symbion Inc., a Nashville, Tenn.-based surgery center company.

Acting at Bredesen's behest in 2007, for example, lawmakers passed a cigarette tax hike expected to bring in $160 million to $180 million a year, most of it going toward education. Earlier this year, faced with Bredesen's threats to slash their TennCare payments, hospitals asked lawmakers to pass a one-year hospital "assessment fee" that would raise $310 million to draw down additional federal matching funds. Other increases included a 2009 package that increased taxes on managed care companies not participating in TennCare. The package, which also raised environmental permit fees, brings in about $136 million annually. The same year, Bredesen persuaded lawmakers to boost employer taxes by an estimated $245 million a year to prevent the state's Unemployment Trust Fund from going broke. The tax is slated to go away when the fund hits $650 million in reserves. A list of tax and fee measures compiled by the General Assembly's Fiscal Review Committee staff, combined with Revenue Department figures and news accounts, shows total increases in Bredesen's tenure exceeded $900 million, although some tax and fee hikes are, theoretically, only temporary.

An attorney for the four confirmed to The Tennessean their plans to fight the mosque through a final hearing on the matter, which is expected to happen sometime next year, keeping the tab open. "I do think it is unfortunate that the county is having to bear this expense, but, that's the way the legal system is," said Rutherford County Attorney Jim Cope, whose law office contracts with the county to perform legal services.

“Traditionally strong markets like the U.S. and Europe will continue to be important hubs despite consolidation in the number of venture firms,” said Mark Jensen, partner, Deloitte & Touche LLP and national managing partner for venture capital services. “However, the stage has now been set for emerging markets like China, India and Brazil to rise as drivers of innovation as they are increasingly becoming more competitive with the traditional markets."